Process for preparing skinless dry sausage and product produced thereby

ABSTRACT

The invention relates to a novel food form comprising a skinless dry sausage having specified form weight, dimensions and water content. The invention also includes a process for making this skinless sausage wherein the sausage is subjected to defined humidity conditions prior to skinning it, and packages of such sausages in airtight containers, wherein the enclosed atmosphere has a low oxygen content.

Unite StatesPat-ent [191 I Gast Nov. 6, 1973 PROCESS FOR PREPARINGSKINLESS DRY 3,235,388 2/1966 Francis 99/109 SAUSAGE AND PRODUCTPRODUCED THEREBY OTHER PUBLICATIONS Refrigerating Engineering, February1954, Page 46, [75] Inventor Barend Cast a Article Entitled Packagingand Wrapping Materials.

Belglum [73] Assignee: Lever Brothers Company, New primary Examiner}-|yman Lord York, NY Att0mey-Louis F. Kline, Jr., Melvin H. Kurtz and221 Filed: Jan. 13, 1971 Edgar Ruff 21 Appl. No.2 106,065 I [57]ABSTRACT 52 11.5. (:1. 426/8, 99/208 The relates to a "ovel Comprising 1int CL Azzc 11/00 a skinless dry sausage having specified form weight,di- [58] Field of Search "9909 208 mensions and water content. Theinvention also inv cludes a process for making this skinless sausage[56] References Cited wherein the sausage is subjected to definedhumiditg conditions prior to skinning it, and packages of suc UNITEDSTATES PATENTS sausages in airtight containers, wherein the enclosed2,882,163 4/l959 Knaff 99/109 atmosphere has a low xygen Qntent3,117,869 l/l964 Sims 99/109 3,170,797 2/1965 Sloan et al. 99/109 2Claims, 1 Drawing Figure j/l7 was W054 72mm: 1 670246! g M1705? fi/Xf? a7 ZIP W475? WJAAI'PIW WWII/MM Tall N45? M/PMM ale/[Vase W/X-P 5701646160/1 4 59 VA-A/A sz'meznu/w 0F fly/FE? 0775 Z/A/KER 7}/ TPf Mgg/l/AFSMP067 P5 Iva/ML 6250 325 189'? 1347'Pfi A1547 47-20% Af/AAPPfiE/AG pew/V6x/wl/orm a #0055 200, [WA/W85? BAPTZZT P46646076 72757442- fifigflP6245? P. 2 l4 F0 This invention relates to dry sausage.

quently Skinning the sausage. In order to obtain a sausage of full roundsection it is necessary to fill the sausage skins initially with aweight of sausage mixture which is about 50 percent more than the weightof the The present inventionprovides, as a novel food form, 5 finishedsausage, e.g. 9 grams of filling for a finished a dry sausage which ischaracterized by having a weight between 5 and 25 grams, preferablyabout 6 grams, a length between 3 and centimetres, preferably about 3.5centimetres, a full round sectionand being without a skin. The presentinvention also provides a @5665: for making such a dry sausage.

Dry sausage is defined for the purposes of the present invention as onewhich comprises an uncooked mixture of meat, salt and spices and whereinpreservation is effected at least in part by smoking, drying and thefermentative action of bacteria naturally present in the meat. Thesebacteria are typically the following:

Lacto bacillus:

Thermobacterum lactis Thermobacterum acidophilus Thermobacteriumdelbruckie Streptobact. casei Streptobact. plantarum Streptobact.fdrciminus In addition bacteria such as Betabacterium fermentiBetabacterium brevis Bacillus cersuis,'Bacillus subtilis Micrococcuscaseolyticus-camlidus are present and produce aromatising and flavouringsubstances. The final water content of the sausages of the presentinvention is less than 24 percent by weight.

Dry sausages can only be eaten after removal of the skin, since the skinis inedible or at least unpleasant in the mouth. Easy removal of theskin, e.g. by stripping with the fingers before eating, can only beachieved practically by having a sausage with a shrunken appearance, asopposed to a full round section, which shrunken appearance, is achievedby incompletely filling the sausage skin; such a sausage has, moreover,an unattractive appearance to the consumer in comparison with a sausageof full round section. In the case of a dry sausage of full roundsection, it is very difficult to remove the skin quickly and completelybefore consumption and hence the sausage of the present invention isskinned before packing. It has been found that this skinning can besatisfactorily achieved by increasing the water content of the skin, butnot that of the sausage, by keeping it in a humidifying chamber for a 7period of 2 hours to 15 minutes at a relative humidity of 90 to 100percent respectively, and at a temperature between and C, preferredhumidifying conditions are described below. The foregoing considerationsapply to any type of sausage skin, including those made from naturalintestine, regenerated collagen or cellulosic material. Considerationsof .price and uniformity generally dictate the use of artificial sausageskins made from regenerated cellulose plasticized with glycerol.

The present invention thus also includes a process for making a drysausage as defined above, which comprises stuffing a sausage skin with adry sausage mixture to such an extent as to provide a sausage of fullround section, smoking and drying the sausage and subsequentlysubjecting it to humidifying conditions which swell and/0r soften theskin without substantially increasing the water content of the sausageand subsesausage weighing about 6 grams.

It has been found that the dry sausages of the present invention, whenpacked in air-tight containers with a reduced oxygen content, especiallywhen packed in substantially oxygen-free nitrogen (oxygen content lessthan 1 perc e n t by vtiume at STP Standard Temperature and Pressure)and wit h a volume ratio of gas (at STP) to sausage of less than 2, havea shelf-life of at least six months at 20 C? V V H V Alternatively thesausage may be vacuum-packed at about percent vacuum, i.e. in air at apressure 9tah 29t309 mafia.

Whichever method of packing is chosen, it has been found that bacterialaction after packing reduces the oxygen content of the gas in thecontainer to substantially zero in a relatively short time e.g. in about7 days in the case of nitrogen packing as indicated above or about 23days in the case of vacuum packing.

When the sausages of the present invention are packed in metal foillaminate pouches openable simply by tearing, as described in more detailbelow, they are attractive to the consumer as a snack item, i.e. a foodform which can be eaten quickly without the use of a knife or any otherparticular equipment. When so packed, the sausages can conveniently behandled in coin-operated vending machines.

There is, moreover, a growing demand for foodstuffs in snack form, andone of the objects of the present invention is to provide meat in asnack form which has, moreover, good keeping qualities and is easilyhandled in coin-operated vending machines.

The present invention is further illustrated by the accompanying drawingand by the following specific example:

A sausage filling was prepared from the following (all precentages beingby weight):

Lean beef meat 49% Lean pork meat 10% Fat pork meat 35% Milk proteins1.5% Sugars 1.5% Salt 3% Spices 0.5% Saltpetre 0.02%

The beef meat is frozen beef which is first defrosted in runningtapwater and brought to a temperature of gl nt 49. The lean pork andbeef are presalted (i.e. caused to absorb preservatives) by grinding (ina Seydelmann grinder Type A200B) with the salt, sugar and saltpetre,mixing (in a Tonnaer mixer Type 300) and tqri sfq d at The presalted lean meat and the other components of the filling were then passed to acutter (Seydelmann Type K 325 R.PP), which forms the sausage fillingmixture. During this process the temperature of the filling componentsis maintained below 5C. to avoid smearing of the fat. This temperatureis generally maintained, at least in temperate zones, by the fact thatthe fat pork meat has a temperature of 20C when added to the cutter. Ifconditions are such that the temperature of the mixture cannot bemaintained below 5C by relying on the low temperature of the fat porkmeat, then additional steps must be taken to cool the presalted mixture.The resulting sausage filling mixture is then stuffed in a cellulosiccasing (diameter 18 mm) with a length of 16.80 m by means of VemagStuffer (type Robot G 250) to give a sausage of full round section. Thesausages are then tie-linked (in a linker Type 140 ACL) to give anindividual sausage length of 3.5 cm and a weight of about 9 grams. 7 W

Therafter the lengths of sausages are suspended in a smoke house foraperiod of about 40 hours and during this time they are maintained at atemperature between 2830C and subjected to wood smoke produced byburning 1.2 kg of wood (a 50/50 weight mixture of oak and birch) percubic meter of smoke house. During this period the lactofermentativebacteria naturally present in the sausage filling mixture are active inproducing lactic and acetic acid from the sugars present and loweringthe pH to about 5.2.

The sausages are thereafter dried for 2 days at a temperature of 22C anda relative humidity of 70 percent until their weight is about 6 gramsand their water content is less than 24 percent by weight. The sausagesnext pass to a humidifying chamber, where they remain for about 20minutes at a temperature of 2025C and a relative humidity above 95percent, as a result of which the cellulosic skin is swollen andsoftened without substantially altering the water content of the sansagemixture. Thereafter they were passed to a Tee Cee peeler which removesthe skins, and packed either in tins at 60 percent vacuum with not morethan 1 volume of air to 3 volumes of sausage or in aluminum foil-plasticlaminate pouches in an atmosphere of nitrogen containing not more than1% oxygen, in such a way that the enclosed volume of gas is less thantwice the volume of the packed sausages. A heat scalable laminate madefrom sheets of cellophane (30 g/m aluminum (27 g/m and polyethylene (50g/m has been found to be very suitable for making the pouches mentionedabove, and packaging is conveniently performed by a Bartelt packagingmachine Type P. 7 14 F0. The

pouches are formed with the polyethylene layer on the inside.

The relatively small size of sausages of the present invention rendersit possible to smoke and dry them more rapidly than larger sausages andfacilitates the maintenance of uniform quality.

It will be understood that the sausage filling components and theirrelative proportions given in the above specific example are notessential for the purposes of the present invention; for example, theproportion of lean beef may vary between 4454 percent and the proportionof lean pork between 5-15 percent.

The lactic acid produced during fermentation has an effect on theprotein fibres of the meat which imparts a firm stable structure to thesausage filling so that this can easily be handled and packed after theremoval of the skin without any risk of disintegration.

What is claimed is:

l. A process for preparing dry sausage which comprises forming a drysausage mixture from uncooked meat, salt and spices, stuffing a sausageskin with said dry sausage mixture to such an extent as to provide asausage of full round section, smoking the resulting filled product forabout 40 hours at a temperature of from 28C to 30C to promote theactivity of lactofermentative bacteria naturally present in the sausagefilling mixture to produce lactic acid whereby said lactic acid impartsa firm stable structure to the dry sausage mixture, drying the resultingfilled product for a period of from about 120 minutes to about 15minutes at an atmosphere of about percent to percent relative humidityrespectively at a temperature between 20 and 25C, and skinning thesausage.

2. A skinless dry sausage produced by the process claimed in claim 1.

2. A skinless dry sausage produced by the process claimed in claim
 1. 